Private Collection, Dallas, Texas

The Provocateur
from the History of Rock & Roll
2007 Fender American Standard Stratocaster
2010
Exhibitions
Bering Art Collective, Houston, Texas, The History of Rock & Roll, October 9 - 30, 2010
 
The Provocateur is the sixth and final guitar in the History of Rock & Roll series—a tribute to the genre’s provocateurs, its monsters, its mythmakers. Inspired by the theatrical shock of Alice Cooper, the chaos of Ozzy Osbourne, the transgression of Marilyn Manson, and the spectacle of Lady Gaga, this guitar is unapologetically confrontational. It doesn’t whisper. It bites.


The front features a neon green spine that runs perfectly along the guitar’s contour—a fusion of man and machine, anatomy and artifact. Red teeth glow from the darkness, jagged and luminous, the focal point of this darkest guitar. Below them, a fingerprint card appears in blue on black: the artist’s own prints, initialed and embedded. It’s not just a signature. It’s a declaration. A record. A provocation. The artist was here.


The grid surrounding the card is marked with handwritten annotations—“RIGHT HAND,” “LEFT HAND POSITIONS,” “Arrangement 19”—suggesting both forensic cataloging and musical experimentation. It’s part mugshot, part score. A visual echo of identity, control, and rebellion.


The reverse is quieter, but no less charged. A single fingerprint floats in the lower corner, accompanied by two dates: 8/10/2010, the day The Provocateur was completed, and 8/10/1909, the birthdate of Leo Fender. It’s a gesture of reverence and rupture—marking the lineage of the instrument while asserting the artist’s place within it. The background pulses with linear patterns that evoke both acoustic vibration and a heartbeat monitor. It’s the rhythm of invention. The thrum of legacy.


The Provocateur is fully functional, but its message transcends playability. It challenges the viewer to confront the genre’s darker truths: the commodification of rebellion, the performance of monstrosity, the line between persona and pathology. It asks what it means to provoke—not just for attention, but for transformation.


This guitar doesn’t just complete the series. It leaves teeth marks.